Since he was seven, Kieran Sherman has been playing tackle football.
Sherman learned just over a week ago that he had made the cut for the Football Alberta U16 Alberta Provincial Team, and will be heading to Kamloops this July to play in the Western Championship.
Kieran started out as one of 325 players hoping to make the team. He made the northern cut, initially, out of 185 hopefuls he was one of 40 to make the Alberta North team.
Another 135 hopefuls where whittled down to 40 for the Alberta South team, then after a two-day camp, the North team, sponsored by the Edmonton Eskimos played the South team, sponsored by the Calgary Stampeders, with the South team coming out victorious.
Kieran, who plays defensive back, waited four long days after Victoria Day to find out if he’d made the final cut, the last 40 to represent Alberta.
To even get to the tryouts, you had to have a nomination from your coach, Kieran was one of five of his teammates who tried out, and the only one to go forward to Team Alberta, although another player from the Buffaloes/Trojans also made the U16 team.
Sherman joined the Camrose Buffaloes Football Club, then Rose City Football when seven-year-olds still played tackle instead of non-contact flag football.
The Buffaloes play traditional 12-man football. Sherman’s favourite position is defensive back. “When I first started out, I liked the offensive positions,” he says. In fact, he was the backup quarterback for his team last season. “But I really like tackling people. I love the contact game.”
At 5’6”, 125 lbs, that might surprise some of his opponents.
Kieran says some of his teammates will be familiar, as he played against them over the year, or even last summer at the Alberta Summer Games, where he played on the Zone 4 team. “So there will be some of the same faces and names,” he says. “And it’s fun to play against really good competitors, to really measure how I’m doing.
“I’m really excited to have been picked. When I heard that I’d made the team, I just was super excited!”
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